Case Number 22055: Small Claims Court

MURPHY'S LAW: SERIES FOUR AND FIVE

The Charge

A maverick Irish cop takes on the London Crime world.

The Case

In Series 4, undercover police officer Tommy Murphy (James Nesbitt,
Jekyll) manages to work his way into the ranks of a major drug
organization in the hopes of finding enough evidence to topple the whole
enterprise and bring its leaders to justice. Meanwhile, Tommy also deals with
the equally challenging personal task of aiding his Alzheimer's afflicted
mother.

In Series 5, Tommy is tasked with finding two undercover police officers who
have gone missing. As he digs through the clues, he uncovers a terrifying
tangled web of drugs, smuggling, pornography and murder. Can he track down his
associates before it's too late?

Holy moly. This isn't the Murphy's Law I remember. I had the
opportunity to review the first series a while back, and while I dug Nesbitt's
performance I found the show a bit lacking. The 90-minutes episodes were a bit
too padded and the mixture of cynicism and light-hearted frivolity was kind of
underwhelming. However, I wanted to give the show another look and see how
things were faring later on. Murphy's Law: Series 4 and 5 (the final two
seasons) feels like a completely different show, sending our protagonist down a
much darker, more dramatically compelling path.

In some text notes included with this set, Nesbitt notes that he and the
showrunners basically felt they had taken the initial idea of the series about
as far as it could go. Influenced by some of the more critically acclaimed
American cop dramas (the influence of The Wire and particularly The
Shield can be strongly felt), it was determined that Murphy's Law
would be restructured as a darker, grittier program spotlighting long-arc
storytelling rather than episodic adventures. What this set delivers is an
astonishing one-two punch of crime drama, presented in the form of two
three-part series.

The program's title was initially presented as more of a comic frustration
than anything else, but it takes on far more sinister shades in this case. When
we catch up with Murphy, he's a troubled, battered man who's had just about
enough of the undercover life. The latest mission is a particularly hellish
assignment (it begins with Murphy getting beaten and held at gunpoint), and
Murphy's overbearing personal life only adds to the strain. Over the course of
these two brief, brutal seasons, we witness a portrait of a man having his soul
stripped away piece by piece.

James Nesbitt is an actor I've developed a great deal of admiration for over
time, and he's in peak form in this collection. Burying himself in the role and
beautifully capturing both Murphy's crushed spirit and raging righteousness,
Nesbitt delivers one searing scene after another. His work in the series finale
is undoubtedly among his finest moments; such strong stuff that it almost
becomes impossible to watch. While seeing the earlier seasons isn't a
requirement for jumping into these two (each season is basically a
self-contained miniseries), our memories of Murphy as a giddy, wisecracking
tough guy add considerable resonance to the moments in which he is reduced to a
hollowed-out shell of a man.

While I found this batch of Murphy's Law episodes vastly superior to
the early stuff, fans of the first series may not like the unrelenting bleakness
this collection has to offer. The series finale is possibly the darkest I've
ever seen, concluding with an image of wrenching pain that will stick with you
for quite a long time. That's not to say that the series lacks in entertainment
(there's definitely a streak of dark humor running through the program), but
this most assuredly isn't light viewing.

About the only negative thing I can say about Murphy's Law: Series 4 and
5 is that the transfer isn't too great. While the series has adopted a
grainy, desaturated, shaky-cam look at times (one of the most explicit ways in
which it seems eager to echo The Shield), the transfer itself still isn't
entirely satisfying. The image looks rather flat at times and detail is
significantly lacking. This looks no better than what you'd get on a
standard-def television, basically. Audio is quite strong, however, with clean
dialogue (though some viewers may have trouble with the thick accents) and an
effectively grungy score. The only extras are text interviews with Nesbitt,
which are worth reading.

Murphy's Law: Series 4 and 5 brings a program that started as a
middling crime drama to a stunning conclusion. Over the course its run, the
series transformed from engaging-yet-disposable programming to one of
television's most impressive crime shows. Highly recommended.